Singapore 21/07/2016 - Chinese imports of unwrought copper and copper alloy rose 25 percent year-on-year but were unchanged month-on-month at 380,000 tonnes in June, according to final trade data released by the country's General Administration of Customs on Thursday.
This took imports to 2.47 million tonnes in the first half of this year, up 25.6 percent from the same six months of 2015.
Imports in the first quarter had been strong due to earlier arbitrage opportunities between the Shanghai Futures Exchange and the London Metal Exchange, opportunistic buying when copper was at low prices and restocking ahead of the peak demand season of April-May.
Market participants had expected imports to slow after March - the arb window has closed since late in January.
Preliminary data released last week, covering both metal and products, showed imports falling 1.7 percent month-on-month in June, making it the third straight month of decline on a month-on-month basis. A contracting trend for Chinese copper imports could be in place in the near term, sources predicted.
The June import data sparked mixed views on the status of demand - while some market observers suggested the strong year-on-year imports in June reflected robust demand, others said demand will shrink further in the near term due to the summer lull and heavy rains in the country that affected downstream copper fabricators.
Meanwhile, China's exports of unwrought copper and copper alloy near tripled year-on-year to 42,615 tonnes in June. The exports have, however, halved from May's total of 84,984 tonnes. Year-to-June exports rose 65.1 percent to 205,809 tonnes.
Chinese copper smelters had delivered metal into LME-registered warehouses in Southeast Asia from late in March due to attractive warehouse incentives and amid lacklustre physical market.
But the financial incentives to deliver copper into LME sheds there diminished from late in June after the LME cash/threes spread returned to contango.
Additionally, Chinese copper scrap imports slipped 13.2 percent year-on-year to 270,000 tonnes in June, which took year-to-date imports to 1.56 million tonnes. This is down 7.8 percent from the same period of last year.
China's copper ore and concentrate imports increased 38.5 percent year-on-year to 1.35 million tonnes in June. Imports rose 34.7 percent year-on-year to 8.04 million tonnes in the first six months of the year.
(Editing by Mark Shaw)